Meat Joy, 1964

Performance and 16mm film on video (color, sound), 10:33 min.
Produced, directed, edited and performed by Schneemann. Converted from original film footage of three 1964 performances of Meat Joy in London, Paris and New York City, and edited by the artist in 2008

Meat Joy has the character of an erotic rite: excessive, indulgent: a celebration of flesh as material: raw fish, chickens, sausages, wet paint, transparent plastic, rope, brushes, paper scrap. Its propulsion is toward the ecstatic, shifting and turning between tenderness, wildness, precision, abandon—qualities that could at any moment be sensual, comic, joyous, repellent.

Festival de la Libre Expression, American Center, Paris
May 29, 1964
Performers: Central Woman: Carolee Schneemann, Central Man: Daniel Pommereulle, Lateral Woman: Danielle Auffrey, Lateral Man: Romain Denis, Lateral Woman: Annina Nosei, Lateral Man: Claude Richard, Independent Woman: Rita Renoir, Independent Man: Jacques Seller, Serving Maid: Claudia Hutchins

June 8, 1964, Denison Hall, London
Performers: Charles Aberg III, Mark Boyle, Marlene Field, Liana N. Johnson, Jocelyn de Noblet, Annina Nosei, Carolee Schneemann and Norman Toynton

November 16–18, 1964, Judson Dance Theater, Judson Memorial Church, New York
Performers: Central Woman: Carolee Schneemann, Central Man: James Tenney, Lateral Woman: Dorothea Rockburne, Lateral Man: Tom O’Donnell, Lateral Woman: Irina Posner/Annina Nosei, Lateral Man: Robert David Cohen, Independent Woman: Sandra Chew, Independent Man: Stanley Gochenouer, Serving Maid: Ann Wilson